Bloody Remnants
by Slynthen Advance
Summary: The Hunter's Dream isn't much of a dream. It's more a nightmare, all-consuming with its maddening power. There are few that survives its grasp, and fewer who escape unscathed. The newest hunters to Yharnam's eternal night, were not among those precious few, and only survived through long and bloody trial and error. And now, they return home, broken, bloody, and lost. M for gore.


Chapter I

Of Blood and Family

Part I

Traumatic Growth

As she walked down the street, Melody couldn't help the grimace that found its way onto her face, having long failed her mental objective to ignore the stares she was getting from the people around her. She knew how she looked, especially in comparison to the people here in particular, as her garbs were designed to inspire fear in those around her. While it was good to know that fear mongering was as easy here as it was back home, it wouldn't do to continue, so it would be a good idea to get a change of clothes soon.

She was dressed rather distinctly when compared to the locals; her fashion choices making her look like she just came out of a reenactment of times. Her black tricorn cap coupled with the detached, black collar that reached the bridge of her nose covering the vast majority of her face. She wore a white dress shirt, under a leather corset held closed by several belts, under a long, grey trench coat, with a black cape that reached her mid-bicep. Simple, brown pants, and dull, knee-length, heeled boots were all that adorned her legs, though she wore carefully crafted, and intricate gauntlets.

Melody carefully maintained her composure as she walked up to the front door of one building in particular, even as her heartbeat skyrocketed. She was worried about what might happen, but she would see it through to the end, just as Gehrman had taught her. With baited breath, she knocked on the hard, wooden door, hoping beyond hope that she hadn't made a mistake.

"Hello?" Asked a young girl, seeming to be nervous.

The girl looked to be no older than ten years of age; with her hair done up in a pair of pigtails. Her hair was an odd shade of green; like healthy, springtime grass. Her eyes were a unique shade of bright blue, reminiscent of the sky. She wore a delicate-looking off-white dress, almost like she was _trying_ to look as cute and delicate as physically possible.

"Hello." Melody responded as gently as she could. Her clothes were _designed_ to make people fear her, so she would have to be careful with what she said. "May I speak to your parents?"

The girl, hearing her voice, brightened, and nodded enthusiastically. She closed the door, and a moment later, Mr. and Mrs. Arcane answered it, seeing Melody. Orion Arcane, the father of the family, looked like he was just out of his thirties, and had black hair, and purple eyes; eyes of a shade that reminded Melody of the infinite cosmos. Noelle Arcane, the mother, looked to be in her mid to late forties, with green hair similar to her daughter's, as well as a matching, green tail that slowly flitted from side-to-side, and vibrant, blue eyes like the water of the sea.

The couple tried to subtly hide the fact that they flinched when they looked into Melody's eyes – the scars crisscrossing over them made her eyes look like dull, shattered, amethyst planets, with charcoal cores – but she noticed, and did her best to nod in understanding. "Are you the Arcane family?"

The man nodded hesitantly. "How can I help you?" He asked, eyeing her warily.

"I have information regarding your missing daughter." He nodded seriously – seeming simultaneously hopeful and terrified – and gestured her in. "Should I just leave my weapon outside?" Melody asked, gesturing to an empty spot on the porch. He simply shook his head, a little amused, and gestured again.

She followed them into the family dining room – which was occupied by a teenage girl, and a boy looking to be just entering the same stage of life, she noted – and said nothing, as they led her inside. The girl, Vera, had black hair, as deep as the shadows left by Flora, and pale blue eyes, like tinted marbles with a dark core. The boy, Tony, had black hair too, though his eyes were a shining purple, though they looked to be slightly tempered. Orion gestured at a chair as he and his wife took seats on the opposite side of the table. She set her Tenderizer down beside the table, making sure to engage its safety, and calmly waited for the memories to subside.

"Sweetie, it's time for you to go to bed." Noelle said, as she passed the young girl. The girl pouted, but nodded anyway, heading up a small staircase in the back of the building, leading out of the kitchen.

"What did you find?" The father eventually asked, worried. He wouldn't deny that he'd seen a strong yearning in Melody's eyes from the moment he'd first looked into them, and it only seemed to get stronger between then and now, but he didn't quite know what to make of it, so he hadn't said anything.

"I'm afraid I come bearing bad news." She said after a short pause. He noted how she refused to meet his gaze as she said that, and her fiddling with the items in her pockets. Another short pause, and an unmistakable scroll was placed on the table, and gently slid toward them. "This was at the scene I found. All I ask is that you don't show any of the younger ones until you deem them ready… _if_ you deem them ready. Nothing on there is pretty." There was a pregnant silence after she said that, and nobody seemed to be willing to break the atmosphere.

She tipped her tricorn cap to the adults at the table as she stood. "Have a good day." She sighed in slight frustration as her scroll buzzed in her pocket. She grabbed it, and glanced at the rest of those in the room, and answered it, with audio only engaged.

"Hello… Mhm… I see… I understand… I forgive you… Yes… Stop apologizing… You're welcome…" She seemed to hesitate for a moment, before continuing. "I love you too… See you then… Bye." She sighed and grumbled, before picking up her weapon, starting toward the door.

"Where are you headed?" Noelle asked, as Melody reached for the doorknob.

She hesitated before answering. "To set up camp for the night." She responded, glancing back.

Mrs. Arcane looked to her husband, who nodded, and turned back to Melody. "What's your name, miss?"

Melody hesitated for a brief moment, as she thought. "Maria Paleblood." She eventually responded, question in her eyes.

"I'd like to offer you a room to stay until you're ready to go, Maria. I doubt that a tent is terribly comfortable."

"I wouldn't want to be a burden-"

"Nonsense, I'm offering. Why would I offer if you would be a burden?"

Melody shuffled in front of the door awkwardly, not knowing how to respond. She knew the longer she stayed, the harder it'd be to leave them behind; and it was already burning a hole in her heart. She _desperately_ wanted to properly say goodbye to her family; but she knew that they would either ostracize her for being insane, or cling to what was left of the girl they used to know, trying to revert her to that girl. She doubted she could live with herself in the event of either outcome, so she'd decided to pose as a huntress who'd found their daughter's corpse. It seemed like she had underestimated the kindness of the people here, be it human or faunus, as she didn't expect to be welcomed into their home.

She didn't have any way of hiding her identity other than hiding her features regardless, so she couldn't stay even if she truly wanted to. "I appreciate the offer, miss Arcane, but I'm going to have to decline."

As the argument devolved from there, the matriarch of the family continuing to pressure the false huntress into staying the night, Vera sighed, activated her semblance, and deftly weaved through the crowd, plucking the huntress' cap from her head without looking. There was no possible way the conversation was going to end that night with the way things were going. As she turned back around to head back to her seat, she noticed the total silence in the room. Deactivating her semblance, she turned toward the huntress, and shared in the shock.

There was no way she'd forget that shade of green.

Melody was tall, had dense musculature, and had an ample figure; with deep, green hair, like the needles of a pine. She had a pair of matching, green wolf-like ears on the top of her head, though they were heavily scarred. The only thing that sat out-of-place on her head was the single streak of sickly white hair, that could have only resulted from immense stress.

The faunus refused to make eye contact with anyone, even as their only male sibling glared at her, seemingly trying to bore a hole through her head.

"Melody?" She asked. A long silence followed, the only sound being that of breathing.

"Yeah." Was her quiet, shaking, reply.

"Why?!" Tony barked from his seat at the table. "Why would you lie to us?!"

"Because I'm not the girl you knew anymore." She responded, head lowered. "I have seen things, _done _things, that would drive people _mad_." Her voice began to shake more vigorously as she continued. "Hell, it _did_ drive me mad…"

"You sound perfectly sane to me." He snarled.

"I'm sane because someone helped me recover."

"I see now." Her father said, sadly. "I remember stories about recruits from the war. They called it shell-shock, I think. Though I don't know of any wars that were fought recently."

A dark, insane half-giggle escaped Melody's mouth. "War? You think a mere _war_ did this?" Her voice shook, and when she finally looked up, tears ran down her cheeks. "In what _war_ does a person get scars that play tick-tack-toe on their skin? In what_ war_ does a person die over, and over, and_ over, and over and __**over andover**__-..." _She cut herself off, and took a deep breath, trying to steady herself. "In what _war_ does a person have to slay so many _humans turned beasts_ that they _drown in blood_?" She failed.

She dropped to her knees, and cried into her hands. "In what _war_ does an entire civilization become the very thing they fear? In what _war_ does salvation fall solely on the shoulders of four _teenagers?_ In what _war_ is the fear of _death itself_ overridden by that of the beasts you fight? In what_ war_ does it all happen in one _god forsaken eternal night?_" She looked back up, shame and fear written on her face. "In what_ war _does_ murder _become so _easy_ that it's _always_ a valid solution?"

As the girl broke down further, her father kneeled, and wrapped his arms around the sobbing mess. She froze, and he tightened his embrace; mildly surprised when she slowly grabbed his shirt in her hands, and wept harder. "I wanted to tell you who I was." She softly mumbled into his shirt, still sobbing.

"Then why didn't you?" He asked, quietly.

"I was afraid."

"There's nothing to be afraid of, Melody. We'll help you through this, then help you recover, and we'll pretend like this never even happened."

Her fists clenched, and her voice got marginally louder. "That's what I was afraid of…" She pushed him back, but only enough to look him in the eyes. "I've _changed_, I've been through _c__haos_, total and complete_ anarchy_,and come back. _Nobody_ goes through what I have and comes out unscathed. I'm not the same person anymore. Hell, I've only recently regained my memories."

"Only recently?" Tony asked once he'd recovered, disbelieving. "You've only been missing for a _month_."

"It's been _d__ecades_ for me_, _if not _centuries__."_ She raised her voice again. "I've _easily_ spent ten times longer in that_ hell_ then I remember being_ alive,_ let alone the week it took me to come here; and that's not even _counting_ the hunter's nightmare." She visibly, violently shuddered, and let her father pull her back into his embrace. "God, there was so much blood." Her father simply held her, as shudders wracked her body.

"Are you sure it wasn't some kind of freak dream?" Her mother asked, having finally composed herself.

"You saw my eyes." She replied. She'd stopped shaking.

"You think you can hold yourself together?" Her father asked, patting her back. She nodded, albeit shakily, sniffling as her tears came to an end, and stood back up.

"But those could just be contacts." Tony reasoned. Melody sighed, but conceded the point.

She reached up to the top of her collar, and unzipped it, removing it after. They stared silently at the abundance of scars on her face alone, and she surprised them when she unfurled her monochrome scarf, her throat littered with just as many scars. She then unclasped her shoulder cape, allowing it to fall to the ground, and did the same with her duster, sash and gauntlets, showing the scars on the back of her neck and hands.

"These are how I know." Was her simple counter-argument. "The dream heals all wounds, but leaves reminders of your mistakes."

"Oh…" Was Tony's short, quiet reply.

Melody rung her hands together, suddenly feeling naked under their scrutiny, not being used to being out of her outfit. "Can you even run in those?" Vera asked after a long moment, referring to her tall, heeled boots.

Melody gave her a grateful look in response. "Walk, run, fight; hell, I can even swim in them if I have to." That startled a chuckle out of most of those in the room, though nobody was sure if it was more out of relief or genuine amusement.

"I'm sorry, but I've got to ask." Vera said after everyone took a moment to gather themselves, still trying to change the subject of conversation. "You said 'I love you.' to someone. Who's the lucky guy?"

"There isn't one." Melody responded, shrugging. Most of the people in the room blinked in confusion, so she continued. "_She_ happens to be the one who pulled me from the depths of insanity. I couldn't handle the dream on my own, and she was there when I needed her." She reached into her pocket, and withdrew a single, almost simple looking ring. It was frosted silver, and cradled a deep, red gem, which almost seemed to pulsate like it had a heartbeat. As she stared at it, she had a fond look in her eyes, and a soft smile on her face.

She briefly shook her head, and slipped the ring on its appropriate finger, having escaped the trance.

The look of utter bafflement on the faces of her parents was mildly amusing, but since the cat was well and truly out of the bag, she figured they'd have questions. As such, she folded her clothing, putting it to the side, and gestured toward the seating in the living room, well aware of how this would sound to anyone who wasn't familiar with the dream.

"Are you engaged?" Her father asked, finally breaking a several minute-long silence.

"As far as legalities go, I probably would be here." She responded, not quite answering.

There was a pregnant silence as her family soaked in that non-answer. "Wait, so… You're married?" Tony asked in a mixture of shock and confusion.

"By Yharnam and Cainhurst law; yes, we are married. However, I sincerely doubt that the laws of either Yharnam or Cainhurst are recognized here."

Her father spoke next. "That's… very true. I'd have to talk with some of the professors at beacon to be sure, but given how you speak of your… experiences, I won't keep my hopes up." There was another brief bout of chuckles and amusement, lightening the air.

The atmosphere was rather abruptly broken when Pearle slammed into Melody's midsection, making her cough out in surprise, and burying her face into Melody's chest, crying. Melody wrapped her arms around Pearle once the event sank in for her, and she broke down too, balling into the girl's shoulder as she held the youngest in the family in a tight embrace. It didn't take long for Pearle to cry herself asleep in Melody's embrace, but it took significantly longer for Melody to calm herself enough to give her family answers to the questions they no doubt had.

As Melody regained her composure, she stroked Pearle's hair in an effort to comfort both Pearle and herself.

"So… Yharnam? Cainhurst?" Tony asked after a long pause.

Melody sighed in both relief and resignation, preparing herself for a long, tiring night.


End file.
